What a Difference a Month Makes

An earlier post reflected on the great spring Blue Wing Olive hatch on the Provo River. One of things that contributes to this is that river flows are low. When the spring runoff begins in earnest the heavy flows begin filling Jordanelle and Deer Creek reservoirs and are released down the Provo River. May is typically a very high river flow month.

The chart below graphs the amount of water flowing through the Provo River in cubic feet per second (cfs). This chart is from a CUWCD website and shows (right to left) the flows increasing substantially around the first of May and beginning to reduce again at the end of May (the river is running at approximately 600 cfs today).



My last trip to fish the BWO hatch was around April 10th. Flows on that date were only 1/3 of what is flowing today (less than than 200 cfs). That outing we were present for one of the most prolific hatches in recent memory. The fish were actively rising and we presented several versions of BWO flies. No success. We then realized there was also an active midge hatch. We changed to one of my top 10 favorite flies - the Griffith's Gnat - and that made all the difference.

Here are a couple of pictures from that trip:

A shot of "Brad's Hole"

A beautiful Provo River brown trout

A river runs through me...